Madagascar Art

Madagascar is a large island 400 km off the shore of Mozambique. It has a central spine of high dry plateau and is noted for its tropical climate. It was first inhabited during the 7th century by people related to the Polynesians who lived along the Swahili coast of Africa, but they were eventually driven away by Islamic traders. In about 1500, kingdoms began to appear - the Sakalava occupied the west coast of the island; the Betsimisaraka empire, which means 'the many inseparable', was located on the south-east coast, although it was in fact an association of villages isolated within a dense forest; and by 1830 the Merina kingdom, which originally occupied the central highlands and eventually expanded over the entire island, absorbed the Sakalava and Betsimisaraka kingdoms. Towards the end of the 19th century, the island was colonized by the French, but it had gained its independence by 1960.

Malagasy art was recorded in 19th-century French texts, but it was not until the beginning of the 20th century that examples of their work appeared in Europe and America. Since the 1970s, however, looting of archaeological sites and illegal export has been rife, which has prompted the Malagasy government to demand repatriation of its cultural heritage from Western sources.

Malagasy artistic output appears to he associated principally with the funerary tradition of the islanders. One funerary tradition, typical of east and central Madagascar - where only a few artifacts have been found - is the practice of 'secondary inhumation'. The practice is that when a person dies their body is either kept in the village to dry, or it is buried in a temporary grave which symbolically 'purifies' the corpse by eliminating all body fluids. After a period of time, the bones are exhumed and re-buried in an ancestral communal tomb. Bach time a new corpse is laid to rest in the communal tomb, the bones of the other corpses are taken out, paraded, and wrapped in silk shrouds which are usually decorated with bands of colors, and then returned to the tomb.

The SAKALAVA occupy a region along the west coast of the island. They bury their dead in the forest, in wooden rectangular tombs. On each corner  and in the middle of the longest sides are large figures of birds men or woman-with or without a child-or copulating couples.

sakalava figure            sakalava pale